CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Fifth year center
Jeff Hunter scored a team-best 15 points in just 19 minutes to lead six Owls in double-figures as the nationally No. 4 ranked Keene State College men's basketball team came out firing and torched the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Saturday afternoon, scoring their most points in a game since 2000 in an eventual 119-81 victory at the Rockwell Cage.
Records
- No. 4 Keene State: 4-1
- MIT: 1-5
How It Happened
It was a comprehensive showing for the Owls, who made four of their first five shots while building a 10-0 lead in less than three minutes and never relented. The lead was 20 (25-5) in less than eight minutes and reached 30 (50-20) in less than 14 minutes. In that time, KSC saw eight different people score, including 10 points from
Octavio Brito and nine points from
Spencer Aronson, and shot a remarkable 68 percent (19-for-28) from the field including making seven of 13 from distance. They
also had six steals and forced seven turnovers. Aronson was the Owls' leading scorer in the first half with 14, making 4-of-6 from three, to continue his hot stretch from the previous two contests in which he was 9-for-16 from distance. His triple at the 4:28 mark made it 53-21, and a dunk from
Wesley Odiase a minute later pushed the KSC lead to 57-22. The advantage ballooned to as many as 37 (63-26) following a trey from
Isaac Ogutuga and layup from
Tahmeen Dupree in the final 2:07 of the half. Keene State carried a 68-34 lead into the locker room after Linton fittingly buried a three at the buzzer. The Owls needed only 16 combined points from preseason All-Americans Hunter and Brito (6-7 FG), getting 52 points from other sources including 32 points from their reserves. KSC also dominated the glass 25-14 in the opening 20 minutes and eventually 54-30 in the game, including grabbing 18 offensive boards.
The Engineers actually shot 55 percent (21-for-38) after halftime, but a Hunter dunk and Dupree layup in the opening four minutes expanded the lead to 78-41, and a Linton three with 15:10 left made it 81-43. Keene State's lead was never under 30 again, and the Owls reached 100 with 7:20 left when
Liam Johnston scored inside off a feed from
Mike Carothers, who finished with six assists against only two turnovers. He has 19 assists and only those two miscues over his last three games (two starts), and as a team the Owls have won their past two road games by a combined 54 points, racking up 49 assists against just 19 turnovers in the process. Later in the game, KSC punctuated the offensive onslaught by draining triples on three consecutive possessions (a 1:12 span) – one from
Jacobe Thomas and the next two from Johnston – as they made it 119-79 with 1:09 to go. The 119-point output is KSC's seventh highest in the Division III era, and the most points they have scored since December 5, 2000 when they drilled New England College 120-81 in Concord. All six of their higher totals than today came in 2000 or earlier. For MIT, it matched the most points allowed in a game in program history – since Worcester Polytechnic Institute scored 119 against the Engineers on February 24, 1977.
"Our continued effort to emphasize the additional pass is showing considering our assist-to-turnover ratio today," said Keene State coach
David Hastings. "We also made a concerted effort to be more aggressive on the boards on both ends. It was a great team win where everyone was involved."
Keene State moved their shooting percentage from the field over 50 percent today with an offensive effort that saw all 12 available players score at least five points. Hunter (7-9 FG) finished with 15 points, five rebounds, three assists, and two steals, while Aronson (5-10 FG, 4-9 3-PT) added 14 points, three rebounds, and two assists. Dupree had a 13-point, 13-rebound double-double to go along with three helpers, while
Mason Jean Baptiste had 13 points on 3-for-6 shooting from three (2-2 FT). Brito (4-10 FG, 2-4 3-PT, 2-2 FT) recorded 12 points and four rebounds. Perhaps most impressively, the Owls had 10 different players record an assist including eight with multiple (Carothers, Hunter, Dupree, Jean Baptiste, Aronson, Odiase,
Nate Siow, Thomas).
MIT actually also had six score in double-digits and were paced by 15 points and six rebounds from Merlin Gogolin (6-11 FG, 1-2 3-PT, 2-2 FT). Will Bland (4-11 FG) and Isaac Dobie (5-8 FG, 3-6 3-PT) each had 13 while Spencer Lin (4-9 FG) and Mike Ewing (4-12 FG, 2-6 3-PT, 2-2 FT) had 12 points apiece. The Engineers also had a positive assist-to-turnover ratio (15-12), but saw KSC shoot 16-for-36 (44 percent) from three in addition to dominating the glass by 24, including 18 offensive rebounds (11 after halftime).
Inside the Paint
- KSC has won three straight in the series, which began in 2017, and leads it 4-2. The Owls are also 3-0 at the Rockwell Cage, including a 92-74 win in their last visit to Cambridge two years ago.
- Keene State has seven games of 20 or more assists in the past two seasons (35 games) and has an average margin of victory of 35 points in those contests.
- The Owls are currently shooting 50.6 percent as a team from the field, 58-for-144 (40 percent) from three, and 76 percent (66-for-87) from the free throw line.
- KSC entered the day with the 12th best assist-to-turnover ratio in Division III.
Up Next
- The Owls conclude a stretch of five consecutive games away from home at Albertus Magnus College (5-0), the 2023 Great Northeast Athletic Conference champions and NCAA tournament participants, on Tuesday, November 28 at 7:00 p.m.
- MIT, who was coming off a 91-82 home loss to Tufts University on Tuesday night and has now dropped five straight since opening the season with a win at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, travels to Salem State University (2-3) on the same night (7:00 p.m.).
